22 October 2013 Dragon's Crown

BAJOAlright it's time to scroll some sides and up some beats in the side scrolling beat em up, Dragon's Crown.

HEXNow before we get too far into the review there is an elephant in the room that I'd like to just get out of the way.

BAJOTwo elephants.

HEXWell, yes. And chances are if you've heard about this game before then you know what I'm going to talk about.

BAJOMassive boobs.

HEXYes, it is massive boobs. Now, I don't want to talk about it much really, I'm just going to show a bit of what the fuss is about and let everyone form their own opinions. All I will say is that although I'm not a huge fan of the character design, I actually really like the art style. And personally I thought the characters were so over the top that they aren't actually sexy, and they're more comical than offensive.

BAJOI did find myself laughing at it at first, I thought they must be trying to be tongue in cheek about it, but it all seemed so straight faced that I thought it came across as pretty crass and pervy I think.

HEXMy big problem was that I couldn't look anywhere else, literally. It's just the way that they move, they don't stop moving it's hypnotic.

BAJOMy boobs don't move in the wind.

HEXAlright well, enormous gravity defying boobs to the side for the moment, let's try and talk about the actual game. So to start off with you choose your character depending on how much of a challenge you want. You have your Fighter, Amazonian and Dwarf who offer a more straight forward brawler type. Or you can go for the ranged attacks of the Wizard, Elf or Sorceress who offer up a bit more of a challenge.

BAJOThen after a quick tutorial you find yourself in the game's hub town. From here you pick up quests and venture out into various dungeons and castles in search of the elusive Dragon's Crown. I admit, I tuned out pretty quickly because you're always coming back to town and talking to people in the town and they just on and on and on and on. Skip it. Skip it!

HEXYeah, the story did just get in the way didn't it? Once you do get into the action it's pretty solid. You mostly use just one button for attacks, but different directions on the stick and jumping opens up a pretty big range of moves, combine those with dashes, blocks and special attacks over six characters and you have a lot to master.

BAJOIt's exciting combat isn't it? And the difficultly ramps up pretty quickly, so it's a good thing you don't have to go it alone. You can either bring in three other players online or locally. Or by finding piles of bones and taking them back to town, you can resurrect NPCs to fight alongside you, but this game shines when you've got a few friends playing with you. Things do get very chaotic on screen, I was always losing sight of where I was and just ended up mashing away, only to find myself in the corner just punching the air not helping anyone.

HEXYeah I think the thing that really makes you stick around is all the phat loots. Each dungeon is littered with chests and hidden bits of loot to uncover. In a bit of a twist tho they don't actually show you what your loot is. You can either just sell it or pay some gold to have it appraised to find out its stats.

BAJOIt's got a bit of a 2D Diablo vibe hasn't it? After every mission you'll have loads of new loot and gear to play with. And of course there's a healthy dose of RPG mechanics to flesh it all out. As you level up you'll get to spend your experience points on either character specific skills or ones that apply to any character.

HEXPlus it's quite a meaty adventure with a single play through taking anywhere from ten to fifteen hours.

BAJOI mean I'm a fan of the old school beat em up and this certainly triggered some healthy nostalgia, but they're quick fire games you know? They were always an arcade experience with a mate that we could blast through in a lazy afternoon. But fifteen hours?

HEXWell fair enough, but it is a bit weird to be criticising it for too much content.

BAJOMaybe if they stopped yapping so much, you could get through it a bit quicker. Shut up! Final thoughts Hex?

HEXWell, Dragon's Crown does deliver on its promise of old school fantasy beat 'em up, but I do think it's a shame they went with such unnecessarily ridiculous character designs. So, I'm giving it 6.5 out of 10.

BAJOYeah, it is totally ridiculous. But I'm just so happy to have a modern beat 'em up, I miss them. I'm giving this 7.5 out of 10 rubber chickens.

Kommando Ando :

ReasonableThoughts :

10 Jun 2014 10:45:50pm

Rating:
The game itself is fun and responsive, but can be a little repetitive. This is much better with friends or online in order to improve your overall experience. There is plenty of looting, monster-bashing, magic, swords and tonnes of weapons and equipment. Purely visceral, and purely satisfying; nothing beats the joys of receiving loot in video games.The story is a basic fantasy story; classic, yet old ground that is simply being retread.The artwork is VanillaWare at their best. Stunning, full of life, and eye-catching.As for the controversy over the female form?Well to me, it couldn't be done any other way. This game is very much a love-letter to classic fantasy; the likes of Conan the Barbarian and Lord of the Rings; D&D material.So of course there will be fairies and old wizards. There will be dragons and beasties. And yes, there will be large breasted damsels. I don't see it being done purely for spank material. I think the artists and developers knew what they were getting into, and decided to go forth with confidence. And I applaud them for it.Clearly it is not a game for everyone. But on it's own merits, it is a fine creation indeed.

ghost who walks :

Masa :

Matabolic :

08 Jan 2014 12:31:50pm

Rating:
I got this game for Christmas and I love the gorgeous graphics, and the blend of classic fantasy beat'em game play & RPG.

I've lost respect for Hex & Bajo as reviewers. Giving a game a bad score just because they feel the female character designs are excessive is really lame. It's standard for Jap-anime. It's a minor aspect of an otherwise cool game.

Hotdog Rocket :

middy1011 :

Hdutt2 :

02 Nov 2013 11:12:21am

Rating:
When I first heard of Dragon's Crown I was excited because this game would bring the classic Beat em up fantasy games to the big consoles. And I wasn't disappointed either this game is great in length and is one of my favourite beat em ups.

Big bouncy breasts and over sexualised characters aside I had plentiful fun unleashing varied combos against a stack of enemies and huge bosses all in a unqiue artstyle which hooked me.

The story is light (except for long text boxes) but that's not the point of a beat em up. Its all about the action and the level up experiene point system is a nice touch. Multiplayer was a blast and I had fun.

Nice to see a lengthy beat em up every once in a while and it was great, arcade fun.

XxHelix2000xX :

handsome g :

In defence. :

29 Oct 2013 12:12:28am

Rating:
With regard to the game's art design and people's issues regarding Hex. A review is an author’s opinion, she is well within her rights to criticise a game. The review spent a minute or so on this issue and this was stated at the very beginning. Scores are SUBJECTIVE not objective. This is why you view more than one review on a subject. She gave her reasoning behind her score due to her preferences. All the important information was included and clearly stated. So there is no problem.

Reviewers are entitled to their own opinion and issue a score based on that opinion. Everything has been justified and explained while covering the entirety of the game.

pookacara :

26 Oct 2013 1:28:14pm

Rating:
After the struggle of character choice,(the elf being the least offensive female characters) the game play itself is a great homage to the sideways scrolling beat 'em ups of my arcade youth. reminiscent of the Dungeons and Dragons games of the 90's that I fell in love with. The fact that you can play with a group of friends is just an added pleasure.

Unit :

24 Oct 2013 9:19:10am

Rating:
I honestly wonder if these brave internet warriors crusading for the right to shame anyone who says bad things about their favourite sexy sexy toys have any idea how pathetic their mewling sounds to the rest of us.

HeyDW :

22 Oct 2013 11:57:28pm

Rating:
This game alone makes me wish I had a vita. So that I can play more of it, while on the go. Dragon's Crown has lovely hand drawn visuals and is based in a hyper stylised fantasy world. Where the men are all manly and then women are all womanly. Get over it. Appreciate it for what it is. Anways need more dungeons.